Let's Try This Again
by chalantness
Summary: Like he said, he was just damn lucky Caroline didn't kick his ass when he showed up at her house. / Compliant to 'Please Don't Fight'


**Fandom.** Tyler/Caroline, Stefan/Katherine, Damon/Elena, Jeremy/Bonnie

Disclaimer: Vampire Diaries © L.J. Smith

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><p><strong>Let's Try This Again<strong>

By sakuracherish814

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><p>He should feel grateful as hell and undeserving of her reaction.<p>

He knew that coming home would be dangerous considering how they left off. That was half of the reason he stayed with Jules for so long; the other half was because he just didn't want to be in that town. But he did miss it after a while. He missed his mom and knew how crappy it was of him to just leave her. And he couldn't just end things like that with Caroline after all they've gone through together.

He was in a pretty dark place at the time but he knows it's not an excuse and he learned that there was some truth to not realizing how much you love something until it was gone.

Like he said, he was just damn lucky Caroline didn't kick his ass when he showed up at her house.

"You would have deserved it," she declares.

He chuckles and nods in agreement as she applies a bag of frozen peas to a bruise forming on his shoulder. She got a few hits out of their reunion and he thinks it could be a _lot_ worse.

She shifts behind him on the couch, knees on opposite sides of his waist, and presses her chest against his back as she kisses his temple. "You don't _dare_ do that to me again."

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><p>It had to have been done eventually; it's a very small town and she is, after all, the mayor of it.<p>

Caroline has this entirely screen-worthy plan in her head and he thinks she watches too many HBO specials on TV. But, he plays along because there's no hope of bargaining the girl out of anything once she's got her heart set on it.

"Caroline?" the woman breathes, pausing in the doorway. "How did you get in?"

"I broke in." He can practically hear her wide, ear-to-ear smile. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you or anything, but it was important."

"Oh. What is it, dear?"

He takes this as his cue and comes out from behind the wall, looking at Caroline with a bit of hesitation. But she winks and gives him a dimpled smile, and there is this gasp and a body slams into him—with not nearly enough force to actually _budge_ him because, you know, _werewolf_—and arms grasp him. His hands slide around her waist and there is this wet spot where her eyes are supposed to be.

"Hey, Mom."

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><p>In all honesty, this reception is probably his most nerve-wracking. Next to Caroline's, of course.<p>

These are the most important people in her life and he wasn't even remotely aware of how crucial their approval of him was until she is pulling up to the giant house and he is sweating bullets. She walks him through the front door and when he gets over gawking at how insane the house is, he realizes they are all congregated in the living room.

Elena is the first to hug him.

She does it in a way where he forgets the last time he saw her he almost sold her to her death and instead remembers that once upon a time they had been close.

He tries to form an apology because he's still extremely guilty, but she shushes him, winks, and passes him off to Bonnie.

Her hug is brief but just as comfortable, and when she steps aside, he is met with an outstretched hand that led back to a smiling Stefan. They shake and he knows the guy has already forgiven him and welcomed him back, which is wild considering their past is questionable. But Stefan has always been _that guy_.

Jeremy is standing there next, and if he considered that his relationship with Stefan was _questionable_, no words could really describe whatever the hell he had going on with this guy.

"I'm glad you found your way back home."

He blows out a sigh and smiles, and Jeremy is laughing, too, for no apparent reason. They both know they already see potential for this newfound friendship.

Damon throws an arm around him and the other around Jeremy and exclaims, "Look at us! All one big, bad, happy family! This calls for a celebration."

Yeah. Maybe he could get used to this.

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><p>He gets his act together and doesn't just show back at school; he goes to each of his teachers and negotiates how to compensate for the loss credits.<p>

Luckily, however, he has Caroline—studious, perfectionist, nagging Caroline—at his side from morning until night each night.

She obviously can't study for him or do the homework for him or any of that, and when he half-jokingly brought up her compulsion he got smacked on his head with her planner, but the company is nice. She makes him snacks and tutors him when he asks for it and just stays with him. It makes it all a lot easier and more manageable when he has company.

At the end of the week (when all of that stuff was due and all of his quizzes and tests were administered) she plants a kiss on his cheek and tugs him towards their lunch table.

"We have to celebrate!"

_Celebrate_ didn't translate to the usual wild parties he wakes up from with a hangover and a torn or missing shirt.

_Celebrate_, instead, ended up being a night at Elena's where they engaged in heated games of Pictionary, charades, and Scene-It _Twilight_ Edition (Damon) after having dinner before that, and blasting each other's heads off in several rounds of Halo before _that_.

Maybe it makes them sound childish, but as they camp out in living room, Caroline sits in his lap and feeds him a bite of her pie and licks some whip cream on his lips.

He could definitely get used to this.

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><p>The following week, he runs into Stefan and Elena making out underneath the bleachers. "Woops," he mutters, and the two break apart.<p>

Except he makes the cliché but practically inevitable mistake of actually confusing the two of them because Elena does this little purring thing, eyes flicking over him as she tilts her head and says, "You came back a _man_ didn't you? God, you're even hotter than that uncle of yours."

He kind of chokes on air because, damn. How could he not?

But Stefan just chuckles, half-amused and half-apologetic, and it takes all of two seconds for him to put two and two together and come to the conclusion that she's totally _not_ Elena.

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><p>After he sort of freaks out on Caroline—werewolf hormones, and teenage boy hormones, and come on, the bitch killed his uncle—she pulls him onto her bed and cradles his face. "Why didn't you mention anything to me?" Any sort of warning would have been decent enough, he figures.<p>

She frowns and tucks some hair behind her ear. "Would it really have made this any easier?" she asks quietly and, for a split second, his mind retorts _duh_; but he sees her point. Since coming back, he is actually able to rationalize a lot better now. (Go figure, personal growth was actually good for you.) "It just so happened when you got back into town, Katherine had to leave for a couple of days."

"To do what?"

She shrugs one shoulder as if to say _who knows?_ "Tying up loose ends? Look, it's taking a lot of adjusting for all of us. A lot's happened."

She scoots forward and sits on his lap, running her hand over his temple and through his hair like she knows comfort him.

Now that he thinks about it, he's noticed the past couple of days how Elena always seemed to be laughing with Damon, touching Damon's arm, standing next to Damon. Actually, the signs were all kind of there just staring right at him. "Damn." How could he not have noticed?

She exhales a laugh and nods in agreement. "I know. It's crazy, right?"

"The crazy part is how he could just forgive her like that," he admits. "How can everyone just be so casual about it?"

"With a _lot_ of effort." She looks him in the eyes, tilts her head, and nudges his shoulder with hers. "Though, I guess it's not exactly far-fetched. She screwed up and hurt the person she loved the most. But part of Stefan always remained in love with her and because of that, we all deal with her. Maybe there is such a thing as loving someone so much that nothing they do can ever change that."

He gives her this look and kisses her lips and kisses her and kisses her; her cheek, her neck, her throat, her shoulder, her collarbone. She sighs and lets him lower her onto the bed.

Okay, so it's not far-fetched at all.

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><p>He kind of figures that one week couldn't go by without <em>something<em> being wrong.

"Hi," he says slowly as he sees Sheriff Forbes standing on his doorstep after school that day. She has two of her deputies with her, this pained look in her eyes, and his hands curl tighter around the doorknob as he thinks of Caroline sitting there, carefree and unaware, on his living room couch while shuffling through her physics flashcards. "Is something wrong?"

"Have you seen Caroline?" Her voice sort of shakes on her daughter's name, and his mind is demanding to know what the hell is going on.

And then he remembers that her mom isn't supposed to know.

"Tyler, who's at—" He curses under his breath and looks over his shoulder at the girl, her eyes wide and her hand flying over her dropped jaw. "What's going on?"

Sheriff Forbes takes a step in the house and Tyler backs up, grasping Caroline's arm. "Get out of here," he whispers. He knows she can tell what's happening.

"Don't move!"

Caroline catches his eyes, her own wet with tears, and swallows a lump in her throat. He squeezes reassuringly and she blurs down the hallway.

Sheriff and her deputies try to pass, trying to force him out of the way, but he just squares his shoulder and says lowly and pleadingly, "You can't hunt your own daughter."

"That's not my daughter. Not anymore."

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><p>"Matt. It has to have been him," she mutters, pacing back and forth on the ancient rug. "I knew something was wrong when I was compelling him the other night."<p>

"You compelled Matt?"

She nods, lacing her fingers together, closing her eyes, and pressing the heels of her hands to her forehead. "There was this thing at The Grill and Matt got hurt, badly, so I gave him my blood to heal him and it sort of slipped out. And then he thought I killed his sister. He was furious with me and demanded answers but when I gave them, he just wanted them all taken away. Why didn't I see it?"

"You couldn't have known that he had vervain," Stefan reassures. Thank God for level-headed Stefan, because he was kind of a mess right now.

"Now what do we do? We can't have the Sheriff come after you guys."

Damon pulls Elena against him and rests his chin atop her forehead as Katherine enters the room with Jeremy and Bonnie. "Relax, kiddies. I've got a plan."

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><p>"It looks like we've got quite the mess," Damon muses, looking around, shaking his head, and turning back to the Sheriff to add, "<em>Again.<em> Not that you would remember, of course."

He helps Stefan in hoisting the last of the unconscious deputies onto cots. They'll probably be out for two days, at least, (he knew from word that Bonnie packed a punch with her spells; he didn't realize until tonight how big an understatement that was) which works out since that's how long Damon says they'll need in order to be vervain-free and compel-able.

"Who told you about her?"

Sheriff avoids his stare and he lets out a sigh, really wishing she were vervain-free _now_ because he wanted to know whose head he'll be bashing in.

He knows Caroline had said _Matt_ but the dude has already been on edge since he got back into town and maybe he was kind of hoping to salvage what remained of their friendship.

Stefan and Damon linger by the edge of the cellar and wait, so he just comes straightforward with it and asks, "Was it Matt?" The Sheriff flinches and he backs away. It's enough of an answer for him and he just wants to get the hell out of there.

As he and Stefan ascend the staircase, they hear Damon mutter, "She's your daughter, Liz," before shutting the cell.

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><p>Caroline is sitting alone on the couch and he suspects the others are keeping their distance for her sake.<p>

His dad and hers were best friends before Mr. Forbes hightailed out of town and his dad became bitter. So he knows all of her little ticks just as well as Bonnie and Elena, and he sees right through the calmed grin she gives him straight to the way her bottom lip quivers when she is too overwhelmed and how she blinks ten times a second to keep from crying.

He can tell that she knows better, too, because the closer he gets the more watery her eyes get until he's opening his arms, muttering, "Come here," and she's running into them.

She spends a lot of her time holding things in and he wants to be the one person she allows herself to let it all out to, so that's exactly what she does. She doesn't fight it; just cries until they've somehow ended back on the couch.

"This is the second time. I don't think I can handle a third."

"You don't have to."

"You don't know that," she reminds. "_I_ didn't know either time would happen."

He pulls her against his chest and squeezes her arm. "Then we're going to have to work a hell of a lot harder."

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><p>He spends the night at her house because she doesn't want to be there alone, and even if she did, he would be damned if he let her. His mom is out like a light (they checked) and knows he goes out for morning runs so she probably won't question him if he times it all right.<p>

She changes into a large T-shirt and flannel shorts and slides between her comforters, pulling him in. He chuckles and kicks his shoes off.

"Are you alright?" Is _he_ alright? He smirks a little. This girl. "You've seemed distracted since we left the house."

"You said it was Matt who told?"

"Oh." She can already tell where this is heading. "Yeah."

"Can you tell me what happened with you two after I left?" He hopes it doesn't sound like a jealous question, because surprisingly, it's not.

She seems to contemplate this for a long moment before humming softly, nodding. "Okay."

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><p>"Don't you want breakfast?"<p>

He turns around and finds her in the hallway, walking towards him. The sun is just rising outside, so the morning light is hitting her through the glass in all the right ways (as if anything existed that could make her _im_perfect). She is still in her PJs and her hair is a perfectly disheveled as she rises on her toes a little and kisses his lips soundly.

The whole scene is—well, it's definitely something he plans on making a permanent part of his morning routine.

"I'm supposed to be coming back from a run, remember?" She ignores his words and pulls him in for another lingering kiss. He chuckles against her lips. "Care."

"Fine," she sighs, feigning annoyance. And then she looks into his eyes and her posture shifts a little, as if she already knows what he's really up to. "Be careful, alright?"

Sometimes he forgets how she just _gets_ him.

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><p>"Tyler" is the first thing out of the guy's mouth when he shows up on his doorstep later that morning.<p>

He can't imagine he has anything better to say. Tyler doesn't know how long he'll be able to control himself so he gets right to the point, courtesies aside. Maybe it wasn't right considering the two were best friends for a majority of their lives and it should mean something, but he has to stop giving the dude the benefit of the doubt. He's not the golden boy he was when they were growing up.

Things change.

"What the hell did you think you were doing, man? I thought I asked you to be good to her."

His eyebrows furrow like they do whenever he gets all angry and hurt and angrier. "That was before I found out that she's a—she's a—"

"I know what she is!" Tyler steps back, draws a breath, and exhales slowly. "What I don't know is how that meant you could break your promise and treat her like crap."

"How could you just be okay with that? And Stefan and Damon—did you know about them, too?" His nostrils flare. "She's been hiding it from everyone! What was I supposed to do? She's a vam—"

It takes about half a second for his fist to make contact with the guy's jaw.

"Alright, so she's a vampire. Does that make a difference?" His voice echoes through the empty house. "She's still _Caroline_. If anything, she's finally learned not to let people like you toss her around. You being an ass and treating her like your second choice won't cut it anymore. I want you to stay the hell away from her and us. You'll never get it, anyway."

Matt shakes a little as he tries to steady himself, eyes wide. "Are you—you're not one of them, too, are you?"

Tyler exhales a bitter laugh. "No. But you don't get to hear the rest." He steps back and turns around, stepping off of the porch. "He's all yours, Stefan."

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><p>"I usually don't encourage useless violence," Stefan informs as he hoists Matt onto a cot in the cellar. "But that," he exhales a laugh, "felt good."<p>

Tyler smirks and laughs as well, closing the door shut behind him and heading up the stairs. Yeah, he figures he's her boyfriend and Stefan's her best friend—if he gets a punch, Stefan'll want one, too. At least Stefan can justify his punch as needing to knock the guy out so he can wait the two days to be vervain-free for compulsion, if he really wanted to.

But Tyler—he just wanted to punch him.

"Caroline never deserved to be second because she's not. She deserves the best. And I'd break any of my own rules to make sure she always has that."

He looks him in the eyes and, yeah, Tyler gets that the words aren't just words, or just for Matt. He nods back and they share an exchange: message received.

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><p>"What if we just run away? We could just pack our things and get the hell out of this town."<p>

He is pulling into the Gilbert driveway when he asks this, and as he parks, he turns his head to see this look on her face of shock, gratitude, anxiety, contemplation, and more shock. Yeah, maybe not the best time to put it out there considering they were supposed to be relaxing since things were back to their normal (or seriously _abnormal_ form another point of view) routine; but still.

"I—don't know what to say."

He shakes his head. "No, I'm sorry. It was dumb."

"Or incredibly sweet," she corrects, breaking into one of her dimpled smiles. "Would you really just run away with me? You just got home."

"Hell, I came back for _you_. And yeah, maybe I missed it here a little, but if you wanted to get out then I'm driving."

Her eyes are shining with warmth and possibly tears and he rolls his eyes. She giggles, knowing how he feels about her dramatic scenes, and plants a kiss on his lips. "It sounds like a lovely idea. You and me. On the road. No chance of Mom or Matt or anyone here finding out again."

He licks her lips, kissing them softly. "No rules. No worries."

She giggles softly and pulls back, lacing their fingers together and squeezing. "But, you know we can't be without these guys."

She nudges towards the house and he already knows. He's considered the idea ever since the incident with the Sheriff, but he knows Caroline can't bear to leave everyone and everything here. He doesn't think he can, either. Maybe he was able to once before, but he hadn't had Elena and Stefan and Jeremy and everyone else to walk away from then.

Why give it up when they are finally getting things right?

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><p>"Oh, I'm sorry. Saturday's no good," Caroline apologizes to her friends (the ones that <em>aren't<em> the usual) as they leave Pre-Cal.

"Why not, Care? We never get to hang out that often anymore," one pouts. She casts a glance over her shoulder at Tyler, who is walking steps behind Caroline with his hands shoved in his pockets, and gets this wide grin. "You've got hot date plans, don't you?"

Caroline laughs and hooks her arm with his. "Maybe next weekend."

Her two friends sigh and leave them for the cafeteria, giving him a chance to pull her aside and slant his lips over hers. She doesn't question it; just kisses away the worries.

(Saturday is a full moon.)

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><p>He's considered telling his mother.<p>

He doesn't know why, especially since he knows how well the Sheriff took the news. (Then again, she hunted vampires which Caroline was, and he is a _werewolf_. Still, he feels as though the same concepts apply.) But he knows his mother deserves to hear it just once, even if it meant having to face the possibility that she may not take it well and Caroline will have to compel her.

"Someday," he says when he tells Caroline this. "I promise myself I will."

She smiles at him proudly and cuts the engine of her Ford. "I'll be right there with you."

He opens his mouth to say something when he is interrupted by a muted thud beside the car, their heads snapping to look out the window.

"Come on, children."

Caroline laughs and gets out, smacking Damon on his head.

Tyler does the same, shutting his door and walking around the car. He sees Caroline taking a bag from Elena, chatting animatedly. Bonnie and Stefan seem to be debating whilst Katherine appeared to be in the midst of a story that Jeremy was intently listening to.

Damon throws an arm around him and smirks. "Time to put the dog in."

He rolls his eyes and follows the rest of them down the steps, catching one last glance of the full moon before it disappeared from view.

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><p><strong>An.** Is it a far-fetched possibility? Yes. Do I really want this to happen? HELL YES.

Anyway, I know this leaves a lot to be desired and is very, very flawed, but I was trying out something new. So tell me what you think (:

It's a sequel of _Please Don't Fight_ and inspired from this comment from **p****OoLbEeRtAtToOs****:** _since we feel the same about Matt and missing Tyler, I think you could make an awesome story about Tyler coming back and finding out what Matt did to Caroline and confronting him about it because Tyler told him to be good to her and obviously Matt totally f'ed that up, and some Forwood sexiness in it would be good too_

I wasn't sure if I was able to put too much sexiness into it, but I hoped you liked it anyway!

_So you read it. Love it? Hate it? Please review it._


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